Treasury Secretary John Snow hinted yesterday that tomorrow's Labor Department report would show that a "good number" of new jobs were created in March.
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That was enough to roil the bond market, even though Snow didn't say how many new nonfarm payroll positions were created last month. A hot job market implies that wage pressures are building in the economy. And if that's the case, the Federal Reserve Board might be forced to continue raising short-term interest rates for the next several months to keep inflation under control.
While Wall Street will have to wait until Friday to see if Snow's description was accurate, two reports released this morning indicate that tomorrow's job creation report could be strong.
For starters, first-time claims for unemployment benefits fell last week below the psychologically important threshold of 300,000. The Labor Department reported this morning that new claims for jobless benefits dropped by 5,000 to 299,000 for the week ended April 1.
At the same time, online recruitment activity is on the rise for the third straight month.
The Monster Employment Index, run by the Web-based recruitment firm Monster.com, soared in March as most industry groups showed an increased number of available jobs.
In announcing its results, Monster said the steady increase in online recruitment activity "suggests continued employment growth and broad, sustained strength in the U.S. job market."
Currently, the consensus on Wall Street is that slightly less than 200,000 new jobs were created in March, following February's tally of 243,000 new positions.
